Method and apparatus for facilitating the transportation of medical images on a communication network

1. A method of facilitating the transmission of medical images on a network, the method comprising the steps of: receiving, from a client application, a transaction request relating to the delivery of at least one medical image from a data source to a data target on a network; scheduling delivery of the medical image to occur at a scheduled point in the future, between the data source and the data target on the network, the step of scheduling comprising ascertaining a relative policy-based priority of the transaction request compared to other previously received transaction requests by determining, from the transaction request, an identity of an individual that issued the transaction request using the client application, where the individual was located when the transaction request was issued, and why the transaction request was issued, sorting all of the transaction requests that have been received and which have not yet started to be executed according to a policy-based priority, and allocating future timeslots to each transaction request to thereby enable the transaction requests to be scheduled over time for execution in the future according to their respective priorities; reserving network resources on the network to enable the medical image to be delivered over the network from the data source to the data target at the scheduled time for execution; interfacing the data source and data target to instruct the data source to transfer the data over the reserved network resources to the data target at the future scheduled time for the transaction request to thereby coordinate delivery of the medical image between the data source and data target; monitoring the delivery of the medical image over the network; and adjusting the steps of scheduling and reserving, if necessary, to accommodate higher priority transaction requests that are subsequently received, the step of adjusting comprising determining which of the transaction requests that have been scheduled over time for execution in the future have a priority that is higher than the subsequently received transaction request (higher priority requests), determining which of the transaction requests that have been scheduled over time for execution in the future have a priority that is lower than the subsequently received transaction request (lower priority requests), and changing the scheduled time for execution of the lower priority transaction requests so that the subsequently received transaction request will be executed at a point in the future after the higher priority requests are executed and before the lower priority transaction requests are executed; and adjusting the steps of scheduling and reserving, if necessary to accommodate adverse network conditions, if the adverse network conditions delay execution of one or more transaction requests to prevent execution of the transaction requests from occurring as scheduled.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of scheduling comprises understanding a work flow of transactions on the network.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the step of understanding the work-flow comprises anticipating upcoming transaction requests from other transaction requests, statistics, or transaction patterns.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising generating a histogram of traffic patterns on the network on at least one of a daily and weekly basis.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the transaction request specifies a requested timing, and wherein the requested timing is under-constrained.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of reserving network resources comprises setting a class of service for the transaction request.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of reserving network resources comprises interfacing with network elements to allocate at least one of a route and a path through the network.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the step of reserving network resources further comprises reserving bandwidth on the allocated route or path.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of reserving network resources comprises rate-limiting medical image sourcing applications to prevent the medical image sourcing applications from transmitting medical images on the network.